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How To Pray To Start The Year

Encouraging Prayer / James Banks
The Truth Network Radio
December 28, 2024 12:00 pm

How To Pray To Start The Year

Encouraging Prayer / James Banks

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December 28, 2024 12:00 pm

In this episode of Encouraging Prayer, James Banks and Robby Dilmore, discuss how to start the year off with prayer. 

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This is the Truth Network. Encouraging Prayer. God offers an open invitation for His people to talk with Him at any time about anything. On Encouraging Prayer, Dr. James Banks, author of the bestselling Prayers for Prodigals and many other books on prayer provides weekly biblical insight to help you learn to love to pray. And now, here's James.

How to pray to start the year. But where we're going with that, well, that may surprise you, James. Yeah, we're going to a place in the Bible that you might not think of right away when it comes to finding help to pray. And that is the genealogy of Jesus on His earthly father's side. The genealogy of Joseph presented in the Gospel of Matthew.

Oh, that's right. And some might think, you know, it's interesting that Matthew presents a genealogy at all. After all, Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, not by Joseph. But in the time He lived, the genealogy of your parents, especially your father, played a vital role. So today, we don't see it in the same way, but back then in Jewish culture, it was almost like a kind of resume saying, you know, this is who you are.

That's right. So that's why Matthew gives Jesus genealogy on Joseph's side because he's writing to a Jewish audience trying to explain that Jesus is the true Messiah. And he includes some incredible people in the list like David and Solomon and Jehoshaphat, all kings, you know, and others you might expect in the line of the King of Kings. And that's all wonderful.

But it's not the part that really helps us pray. So, what do you mean by that? Well, you know how people only talk about their famous ancestors? You know, I can trace my family back to the Mayflower and, you know, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and I share a grandparent, all that. But I'm sure there were plenty of horse thieves that the family never talked about.

And we need to talk about them because let's face it, there's a little horse thief in all of us. Speak for yourself, but no. I mean, it's really true.

My family's been in transportation for decades. But there's some famous ones we remember, right? Right, right. It's only because of our pride that we just remember the famous ones or maybe out of shame. I don't know.

But that's just the thing here. Matthew doesn't do that. Matthew gives us a genealogy we can relate to that includes the rascals as well.

For example, Jacob's in there and Jacob's name basically means one who deceives. Ah, so you're saying that Matthew did this to show us that Jesus really is Emmanuel, God with us. And that's just what the angel tells us in this same first chapter of Matthew. So just look at some of the others Matthew includes like Rahab.

Right. I mean, Hebrew genealogies usually include men, but Matthew gives us women as well. Rahab, she was a prostitute.

That's right. And she wasn't a Jew either and neither was Ruth. And, you know, so as such, they couldn't go into the presence of God in the temple.

What about Tamar? Oh, man, she goes way back to Judah, her father-in-law, and she tricked him into sleeping with her without knowing it. And so he had a child by her, you know, after her husband's death.

So basically, they're talking about a dysfunctional family here. And that's the beautiful thing that can really help us pray. But more on that in a moment because Matthew does all of this on purpose. Tim Keller in his great book, Hidden Christmas, points out also that Jesus is descended from Bathsheba, whom Solomon, of course, committed adultery with and then killed her husband Uriah, who, by the way, was one of his 30 mighty men who had risked his life for him at another point in David's life.

So this is all sordid stuff. And, you know, Matthew is emphasizing that because of the way he doesn't mention Bathsheba by name. He calls her the wife of Uriah the Hittite. And Keller says it's not a slight of Bathsheba, it's a slam of David.

In other words, calling to mind what it was that he did yet again. Oh, I see where you're going with this, or rather where Matthew was. Matthew was pointing out that Jesus' genealogy was filled with flawed people so that really we could understand, no matter how you looked at it, that Jesus was not only the Son of God, but really was also the Son of Man.

I mean, very, very human. That's right, but without sin. And Matthew's point is that Jesus can relate to us.

He knows what it's like to be human and to be weak, and because of that, he really gets us and he really is able to help us. And that shows us the best way to pray to start the year. All right, how is that? Well, how do most people start the year? We're thinking about things they'd like to do better in the next one, right?

With resolutions and the like. All right, because even if they don't make resolutions, they do set goals, and in order to do that, you naturally have to admit that there are some places in your life where you'd rather like to do better? Yeah, that's it. And because Jesus is who he is, you can give him all of it, all the bad stuff. You know, it's almost like you can hear him saying, let me tell you what one of my grandfathers or grandmothers did.

I get it. Oh, so that's it, isn't it? A great way to pray as we start the year is to really just humble ourselves, to be real with Jesus about all of it. Yeah, that's it.

That's right. Just give him all of those areas where you need help every day. Be open and honest with him about it. Step by step as you're making progress, and you will if you call on him, and just give it to him, keep giving it to him.

Humble yourself before him, depend on him, and you will be blessed. Oh, that's awesome. You know, I love where that came out, James. You know, will you wrap things up with a prayer? Yeah, let's do it, love, too. Oh, Jesus, we praise you that we can come to you just as we are, and we praise you that you really get us, that you really understand that you are a high priest who empathizes with us. And so, Lord, we just cast ourselves on you as this new year starts, and we just praise you that you've got us. Help us. Oh, help us. Just humble ourselves and stay very close. In your name we pray. Amen. You can hear more from Pastor James by visiting his website, jamesbanks.org, or by visiting Peace Church in Durham, North Carolina. May God bless you and encourage you as you pray.
Whisper: medium.en / 2024-12-28 14:28:09 / 2024-12-28 14:31:13 / 3

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